Many individuals have written about my remark that I went swimming with freshwater crocodiles in Australia. For these unfamiliar with Australia and thought I used to be nuts, there are two varieties of crocs – saltwater and freshwater. You may inform the distinction because the salty has a spherical mouth, and the freshie has a protracted, skinny mouth. The salty is the one that may seize you, spin you round to drown you, then stuff you underneath some lengthy to season you correctly earlier than having dinner.
The freshie will eat fish. It doesn’t lung out and take down giant mammals coming for a drink. Sure, after first fishing for barramundi on the South Alligator River, when there are not any alligators in Australia, educating me how you can spot them coming so I didn’t develop into their dinner, we went inland to a lake that was surrounded by freshwater crocs, and he dove in. I believed he was nuts. He yelled, come on, these are freshies.
It was an exquisite, worthwhile tour. I might like to do it once more sooner or later. The distinction between alligators present in Florida and crocodiles is that alligators are dark-colored with a broad, rounded snout and are normally present in freshwater. Crocodiles are grayish-green and like coastal, brackish, and salt-water habitats. Nonetheless, the Australian Salties may also survive in freshwater. Whereas I used to be in Darwin, one giant Salty got here onto the seaside, and other people scattered. To allow them to go for a swim within the ocean as properly. Alligators in Florida are freshwater, so that you received’t see one strolling within the ocean. You undoubtedly don’t swim the place they’re.